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Poster: | deadmax | Date: | Aug 14, 2011 5:44am |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | September '73 |
The first few shows are good, the 8th is a big party. The 17th's first set is a wunderkind. The horns are present in every show but towards the end of the month they start playing the ENTIRE second set with horns. I like them with WRS and a few other songs but they ruin EVERY Eyes of the World! Martin, I'm sure, is celebrated and a "treasure" and all that but he doesn't know when to stop playing and let THEM just play. He doesn't listen to what they are doing and some of his playing sounds like someone has his gonads in a vice. Truly awful stuff at times.
Am I missing something with his playing on Eyes? Is it good? Listen to the 17th and see if you can without making a sour face when he really gets going.
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Poster: | jerlouvis | Date: | Aug 14, 2011 11:31am |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | Re: September '73 |
This post was modified by jerlouvis on 2011-08-14 18:31:25
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Poster: | deadmax | Date: | Aug 14, 2011 12:54pm |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | Re: September '73 |
But I do applaud the "half-assed" attempt. At least they tried.
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Poster: | light into ashes | Date: | Aug 15, 2011 11:40am |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | Re: September '73 |
There doesn't seem to be as much outright squealing on 9/15...the Truckin' jam is done differently than on the 17th, and the Eyes seemed more jammed-out. Also the Let It Grow - I think this is the song where the horns fit in the best, it's more natural for them. (Their chord backing in Eyes just didn't seem to fit well with the song's bounce.) Let It Grow is quite good considering it was new to the Dead as well (they only started playing it on 9/7), and the horn players would have been familiar with it since they'd also worked on it in the studio.
9/15 has an interesting extended outro to Let It Grow - there's a spot where the band lays back & lets the horns take over for a bit, there's some fluting & yelping that reminds me of Charles Lloyd in the 1/14/67 Schoolgirl; then it ends with a nice extended Jerry/Keith space. Though the Dead had somewhat rigid second-sets on this tour, at times like this it feels like they're deliberately dawdling & seeing what comes next, rather than heading for the next song.
The horns pretty much stay out of Stella Blue except for some quiet chord support at the end...and they don't add that much "cajun rhythm" to Sugar Magnolia, nor do they hurt much.
Martin Fierro later said, "The deadheads hated me. They really didn't want to hear horns with the Grateful Dead... The fans didn't like the horns so the Dead finally said 'Fuck it!' But we had a great time... We rehearsed, but we didn't have written arrangements, we had head arrangements. Sometimes it sounded pretty good and sometimes it was a little rough."
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Poster: | jerlouvis | Date: | Aug 15, 2011 2:27pm |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | Re: September '73 |
This post was modified by jerlouvis on 2011-08-15 21:27:00
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Poster: | light into ashes | Date: | Aug 14, 2011 11:03am |
Forum: | GratefulDead | Subject: | Re: September '73 |
I had to laugh during that Eyes, it was pretty funny. So I guess I find the horns more amusing than enjoyable there...
It does add a different flavor, though. The horns kind of fit in well in Let Me Sing Your Blues Away, a song apparently written in imitation of the Band's style. And they're also very present in Let It Grow, with the same kind of freakout towards the end, kind of an odd mesh since the Dead are still chugging away in their normal style. There's not really a whole lot of Jerry/Martin interaction it seems, it's like they're on two different tracks. Indeed, one notable thing about the September tour is that the horns were put in very "structured" songs, when you'd think they'd shine a bit more in a more freeform jam like the Other One where there would be some real interplay with the band.
The horns are in Truckin' too, doing more synchronized riffs - though I'm not sure if there was much rehearsal at all! Truckin' caught my ear because Keith is playing organ instead of piano - very unusual & different.
Someone like jerlouvis would be better able to say whether Martin's good in his style or not; for me the blend is interesting but not something I want to hear a whole lot.